Sci-Fidelity

About a year ago, The Argument released our first album—by way of one song a week, each with an accompanying essay. That was a big move for us. With 11 songs written about various thoughts rattling around our 48-year old brains, we brought our harmonies out of the basement and onto the internet.

Well, we’re back, now on the verge of 50, and excited to release new music in the form of a movie soundtrack inspired by a much-loved short science fiction film from our youth, “All Summer in a Day,” based on a short story by Ray Bradbury.

In 1982, this little gem of a 28-minute film was distributed on PBS and wheeled into American classrooms on squeaky A/V carts. As a kid, Brangien was incredibly moved by the film, its message and the setting on a planet where it rains for 9 years straight (this was many years before she moved to Seattle). She repeatedly referenced it with me, recounting details of the story, and scenes that had stuck with her all these years. Then, about 18 months ago, she ordered a copy of the film on DVD and suggested we make up some songs based on the film. And so this project was born.

There were (are?) a few (many?) catches to work through, the first being who has the rights to the film. The original production company, The Learning Corp, has long been dead, and the film has bounced around to different owners ever since (at one point, in a series of odd ownership swaps, being batch-purchased by Mobil Oil Corporation). But instead of being paralyzed by this ownership ambiguity, we decided to continue writing songs, and worry about the fine print after we’d finished.

We can report that the music—25 songs, a mix of instrumental and lyrical—is now complete, and in the process of being mixed by our good friend Michael Cozzi (who mixed our first album too). This is probably a good time to qualify the word “soundtrack.” It’s more like a 28-minute soundtrack/music video/musical? As always, we’ll have plenty to say (in the form of an essay) before the music is released. Later this year we hope to show the film with The Argument’s new soundtrack, along with the cool backstory of the movie. More to transmit soon ...

A photo from Michael’s studio where the soundtrack is now being mixed.